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A Blaze in the Northern Sky
A Blaze in the Northern Sky is the second studio album by the Norwegian black metal band Darkthrone. It was released on February 26, 1992, through Peaceville Records. It contains the band's first black metal recordings, and is considered a classic within the genre. Background Darkthrone's first album, 1991's Soulside Journey, was a Swedish-styled death metal release. After recording Soulside Journey, the band began writing songs with more black metal traits. This yielded the instrumental demo Goatlord. After recording Goatlord, three of the bandmembers—Fenriz, Nocturno Culto and Zephyrous—had decided that they wanted to focus on making black metal music. Bassist Dag Nilsen disliked this shift in direction, and quit the band. However, he agreed to record his bass parts for the album as a session member. A Blaze in the Northern Sky was recorded during August 1991 at Creative Studios in Kolbotn; the same studio where Mayhem recorded their influential Deathcrush EP. In an interview, Fenriz said that the album was somewhat "rushed" and that many of the songs have "death metal guitar riffs" played in a "black metal style". Due to Darkthrone's sudden change from death metal to black metal, Peaceville Records was unwilling to release the album as it was. The band then threatened to release it through Deathlike Silence Productions, the record label owned by Øystein "Euronymous" Aarseth of Mayhem. However, Peaceville eventually agreed to release the album as it was recorded. Release The album was released by Peaceville on 26 February 1992. The first CD pressing was limited to 2000 copies and had a white disc. The person who appears on the front cover is Ivar Enger (Zephyrous), the band's rhythm guitarist. It was remastered and reissued by Peaceville in 2003, as well as being repackaged in a cardboard digipak. The second chapter of a four-part video interview (spanning the first four albums) with Fenriz and Nocturno was also included. A Blaze was reissued again through Peaceville in December 2009 as a double gatefold LP on 180 gram vinyl, limited to 2000 copies. Critical reception In their contemporary review of the album, Eduardo Rivadavia from AllMusic gave A Blaze five stars out of five, calling it "a classic whose almost indefensibly lo-fi standards would reinvigorate an entire strain of black metal". Valefor from Metal Reviews wrote that it "would come to epitomize True Black Metal ... raw production, simple riffs, no color on their album covers... just pure frozen evil."Valefor: [http://www.metalreviews.com/reviews/detail.php3?id=1926 Darkthrone - A Blaze in the Northern Sky]. Retrieved 4 October 2012. Channing Freeman of Sputnikmusic called the album "triumphant," with a balanced blend of "frozen production and guttural screams" and "a sense of community". In 2009, IGN included A Blaze in the Northern Sky in their "10 Great Black Metal Albums" list. Track listing Personnel ;Darkthrone *Nocturno Culto – lead guitar, vocals *Zephyrous – rhythm guitar *Fenriz – drums, backing vocals ;Studio musicians *Dag Nilsen – bass guitar ;Production *Dave Pybus – album cover design References Category:1992 albums